Taking a poll to see if anything is similar with our cc patients……

My dad was diabetic, took Zocor for cholesterol, had gout in hands, elbows, knees and feet, had angina.
He was career Air Force-(spent time in Asian countries: Korea, VietNam, Thailand, as well as Europe).
He grew up on the Monangahela River (PA). His father was a coal miner, so dad spent time around that type of environment until he graduated high school.
Used sacharin tablets early on to sweeten his coffee switching to SweetnLow 10 or so years ago. He was an athlete (baseball/softball). Drank when he was single and early in his marriage, only once in a while the last 45 years of his marriage. Smoked Lucky Strikes; he quit 27 years before he died. Drank diet pepsi like it was his responsibility to keep them in business. Loved drinking Tang.

Dad was dx diabetic about 8 years before he died, the gout came about 3 years before he died. Otherwise, he really was very active and healthy. His mind was sharp even to the day he died.

Jolene

I was in the Air Force for 24 years. I was an avionics mechanic. I did find that being around certain type of plastics and soldering parts could be a cause of CC. Is it environment? Spent 24 years around aircraft and all the toxins associated with aircraft.

I was on cholesterol meds for over 26 years before I was diagnosed with CC. Cancer did not run in my family.

Unlucky? Environment? Would be nice to know if we have something in common other than to kick the butt of this terrible disease

Louise, Your remarks did make me smile and we do need a little levity here now and again. It is also so true.

LuLu, I have also been told that 2 people can be exposed to identical circumstances and in some it will develop into cancer & in others it will not. I guess predisposition, body chemistry and maybe just the luck (or lack of) of the draw all plays into it. Apparently the possibility exsists in all of us and manfests in some and not others.

Just to add a little more to the mix, thinking back, the only signs we had in the beginning were that he had some slight pain in his right leg that they could find no cause for and also tired alot which was not normal for him . He was never jaundiced until the last week even though most of his liver was compromised. He was gone in less than 2 months.

As for balance in our system, my 82 year old Dad was treated for an infection with high dose antibiotics and got c-diff. He keeps being treated & keeps getting it back and it was explained to us that the antibiotics are so strong that it kill off the good bacteria and that causes the c-diff. Now they have to treat him with more meds to try to get rid of it which is probably keeping everything out of balance. Our bodies are delicately balance and made to protect & heal itself. I sometimes feel that what we are all given to help & to cure us is actually making us sicker or killing us! Just my very unprofessional, uneducated opinion!

I am not a scientist and do not usually enjoy science classes, but I’m wondering about the controls in this unofficial study. (My husband teaches science and scientific method to 8th graders.) What about the people (like my husband) who have been on many of the mentioned meds (celebrex, cholesterol meds, high blood pressure, gabapentin for neuropathy, he’s overweight ….) and have not been diagnosed with any cancer? Are they at higher risk or maybe already have an undiagnosed cancer? What about age at diagnosis? Many of us experienced jaundice. Would a simple bilirubin test work as an early warning system, and how often would such a screening need to happen? Would the information (and time) gained by more frequent bili counts offset the cost of the more-frequent tests?
If this sounds like I’m raining on your parade, I am sorry. The question raises more questions without seeming to provide any quick answers, because there are so many variables in the people and in the disease.
And from a statistical standpoint, mere co-existance does NOT mean causation. Classic example of that is that when temperatures rise, crime rates go up and the amount of ice cream consumed rises, too. But does eating ice cream cause the crime rates to rise? I hope that brings you a smile.
Enough already!
Louise

“Our immune systems are becoming weaker and over-taxed. Even the medical profession’s first line of defense (the antibiotic) is becoming less and less effective against resistant new strains being created daily as the bacteria mutate. Since Louis Pasteur discovered the germ theory of disease that states germs are the cause of disease, time has proven him correct. But note Dr. Pasteur’s dying words: “The germ is nothing, the inner terrain is everything.”

The inner terrain referred to in Dr. Pasteur’s statement is now being called our biological terrain and comprises our body’s digestive tract, lymph system, blood, urinary tract, interstitial and interstitial fluids. Our bodies are alkaline by design and acid by function. Maintaining proper alkalinity is essential for life, health, and vitality. Simply put – an imbalance of alkalinity creates a condition favorable to the growth of bacteria, yeast and other unwanted organisms. All leading biochemists and medical physiologists have recognized pH (or the acid-alkaline balance) as the most important aspect of a balanced and healthy body. They have long known that the maintenance of an alkaline pH in our tissues and cells is critical to cellular health. In contrast, our digestive tract (except for our normally alkaline mouth) has varying degrees of acid by design, and our urinary tract should be slightly acidic for healthy function.
We live and die at the cellular level. All the cells (billions of them) that make up the human body are slightly alkaline, and must maintain alkalinity in order to function and remain healthy and alive. However their cellular activity creates acid and this acid is what gives the cell energy and function. As each alkaline cell performs its task of respiration, it secretes metabolic wastes, and these end products of cellular metabolism are acid in nature. Although these wastes are used for energy and function, they must not be allowed to build up. One example of this is the often painful lactic acid which is created through exercise. The body will go to great lengths to neutralize and detoxify these acids before they act as poisons in and around the cell, ultimately changing the environment of the cell. Most people and clinical practitioners believe the immune system is the body’s first line of defense, but in actuality it is not. It is very important, but more like a very sophisticated clean-up service. We must instead look at the importance of pH balance as the first and major line of defense against sickness and disease and for health and vitality.

If we were to ask “What is killing us?”, the answer might be “ACIDOSIS”! It has been demonstrated that an acidic, anaerobic (lacking oxygen) body environment encourages the breeding of fungus, mold, bacteria, and viruses. Let’s look at an example. If we were to seal the door to our freezer and then unplug it, come back and open the door in two weeks, what would we find? Mold, bacteria, microscopic bugs. Things will be growing and multiplying. Where did they all come from? They did not sneak in – remember the door was sealed. The answer is . . . “they were always there”. It is simply that the environment changed to a more inviting and healthy one for the “critters” to live in. This can be likened to a shift in our biological terrain from a healthy oxygenated, alkaline environment to an unhealthy anaeorbic acidic environment. You see what is healthy for us is unhealthy for the body attackers and what is healthy for them is what is unhealthy for our body.

A state of acidosis is simply the lack of oxygen and available calcium which the body uses to maintain its alkaline balance. Calcium makes up 1.6% of our body weight. It is literally the human glue that holds the body together……”

There’s more but didn’t want you to hate me for posting all this. =0)

Amy, This is a great topic. I have actually been working on a survey that I hoping to contribute in some way.

This is what I believe is the reason for my husband getting this cancer…

1. Genetic predisposition.
2. Environmental toxins..in his case it was gasoline, oil and grew up in a small home and mom and dad both smoked. …someone I met in my doctor’s office, her dad passed of CC, he worked in a fragrance plant…another toxin, obviously smoking.
3. Diet and nutrition. Too much red meat, no fruits at all and very little vegetables. Lots of process foods.

Signs his body was not healthy…..
1. slightly high blood pressure
2. Chronic gout
3. Heartburn, acid reflux
4. 30lbs overweight and carried in his gut

Therefore, things I would like to know if some have in common are…

1. GI cancers in family
2. environmental exposure
3. overweight
4. nutrition
5. Other issues such as heartburn, excessive stomach acid.

I think if find some common elements maybe we can learn something.

I have also raised the question regarding genetic expressions, and I was told that the field of genomics is in the early stages of research and many, many, more mutations have not been discovered as of yet. Which then leads us to the question as to how much research is dedicated to CC considering the classification of a “rare” cancer?